Our Dreams Are Smoky Mirrors
by Cerulean Pen
Summary: "If I could rescue everything I've destroyed, I would have ribbons of paper, a trash can lid, and Cat"…/Or, how Jade copes with her problems. Cat/Jade. 75th story!


Our Dreams Are Smoky Mirrors

Summary: "If I could rescue everything I've destroyed, I would have ribbons of paper, a trash can lid, and Cat"…/Or, how Jade copes with her problems. Cat/Jade.

English Romance/Angst Rated: T Chapters:1 Words: Cat V. & Jade W.

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_Jade&Cat, Cat&Jade._

It's not the perfect fairytale Cat desired, but somehow, it's even better then Cinderella.

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Jade discovers scissors when she's left home alone (big surprise) and she's trying to find something sharp enough to gouge a chunk of cheese out of the huge wedge in the fridge. Scissors are new; they aren't vulnerable (unlike her), but they're sharp, edgy, and flashy (just like her) and Jade is speechless when they slice a perfectly sunny strip of cheese into her hand. These are amazing, perfect, and-

That's also when she discovers scissors are dangerous. Jade accidentally presses the tip into the exposed flesh of her open palm, gasping as little droplets of crimson blood begin to drip out. It stings, but for some reason, Jade is utterly enthralled by how scissors work-they are useful, they are dangerous, they are pretty, and she pockets them. The cheese is forgotten, as she marches around the house, snipping things up to prove to the world that she's not afraid.

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Cat discovers red velvet cupcakes after her parents split up (she's too young to understand what a divorce is) and she's hungry, because the strangers who came into the house forgot to feed her. She had been hiding in her closet, thinking that these strangers-social workers, they called themselves-were here to hurt her. They weren't, and now Cat is lugging a huge, dusty cookbook out from beneath the sink, flipping through the pages absent-mindedly. Then she sees them-red velvet cupcakes, and she knows that they're the color of happiness, bursting with creativity and energy (just like her) but they're also the color of blood (just like her.)

It takes a lot of mixing, stirring, and guessing, but a few hours later, covered in flour and sweat, Cat takes the tray out of the oven, burning her thumb in the process. It's then that she learns that her happiness comes with pain, but it's a fair bargain, so she simply cools the burn and samples the cupcakes. They taste like fireworks and gilded butterfly wings, and they're so perfectly perfect (unlike Cat.)

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Jade gets into Hollywood Arts because she sings a song about death (so very Jade-like) that starts all delicate, but gets stronger, more powerful, and she lets it reverberate around the room, filling her throat, her chest, her very soul. It sounds so cliché, but apparently it works, because she's in.

In the hallway, after her audition, there's a strange girl, who is dancing around in circles barefoot, her hair the exact color of red velvet cupcakes. Jade stares at the dancing girl for a long time, at the hippie skirt brushing her knees, at the colorful flower clipped in her hair, at her pale, heart-shaped face. Finally, the girl stops, stares at Jade for three and a half seconds, and smiles widely. "I'm Caterina Hannah Valentine, but my grandma used to call me Cat," she whispers, twirling a lock of hair between her fingers.

Jade doesn't know how to react, mostly because strangers don't usually talk to a girl like her, with highlights and piercings and a giant pair of scissors. Finally, after they've stared at each other for another minute or two, Jade reaches over, trims a long lock from one of Cat's crimson strands, and tucks it into her pocket for safe keeping. "The name is Jade West," she speaks, waiting for Cat to start crying, or scream at her.

Instead, Cat beams, giggles, and adjusts the large flower in her hair, before picking up her bag when her name is called, a twinkling in her eyes. Jade is upset-why didn't the girl react? "Jade's a pretty name. And you can keep my hair, although the dye will wear off eventually." Cat proceeds to skip into the room, leaving Jade in the hallway, holding onto her scissors, and Cat's hair burning a hole in her pocket.

Jade cuts off one of her highlights (blue) then the other (white) and braids them into Cat's red strand, until she's got one interwoven mesh of each other.

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Sometimes, Jade wants to stab Cat with her scissors, to cut her bald, to scream, to simply crush Cat into a thousand powdery pieces because she's so irritated. Then, other times, Jade wants to kiss Cat so bad, she forgets about Beck, and spends lunch period staring at Cat from across the table, as she talks about her weird brother.

Cat knows what Jade likes. Jade likes scissors and Beck and Tori (sometimes) and making fun of Rex and Jade will like Cat one day, and make fun of her the next. But Cat doesn't mind, because she'll make red velvet cupcakes for Jade, who actually smiles, but ends up cutting up the papers that the cupcakes are wrapped in.

Love is like a butterfly to Cat-it flitters around her, teasing her, persuading her to follow, but whenever she actually tries to catch it, it flies out of grasp, leaving her alone, but more determined. Cat has never caught love, but when she sees Jade, that butterfly seems to be closer then ever-still out of reach, but closer, closer, almost there.

Jade expresses herself with scissors (she still has them, and they still have a little stripe of blood that won't wash off.) Cutting up anything that gets in her way is rewarding, refreshing, takes her mind off of everything else-if she could cut up Beck and Cat, and glue them together, all of her problems would be solved. But she can't, so she cuts confetti, and clothing, and curtains, and cardboard. She still sings, but cutting is better.

Cat is fascinated by Jade's fascination with scissors. Every once in a while, when Jade is in a good mood, Cat will flitter by (just like that love butterfly) hand Jade whatever flower is in her hair. "Can I use the scissors?" Jade usually hands them over, and if she does, Cat cuts up every little piece of paper that has ever belonged to her father. After she's done, Jade cuts up the flower that was in Cat's hair, and Cat swells with pride. _See that girl, cutting over there? That's my flower she's cutting: not Beck's, not Andre's, mine._

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They're in the RV, alone, and Cat doesn't know exactly what she says, but somehow her lips are against Jade (red velvet cupcakes, butterflies, scissors, and b l o o d) and they're on the bed together, and she's free. They're a tangle of limbs, hair, and sorrow, but it also makes them free, because Jade knows what she's been missing, and Cat knows why Jade just discovered what she wanted.

After it's over, they are both sweating, legs tangled beneath the thin sheets, fingers laced, lips swollen from kissing, bruised from bites, and covered in a thin sheen of red from Cat's dye rubbing off. Strips of brown start to run through her hair, but Cat doesn't mind, because Jade doesn't mind, as her fingers trace Jade's sturdy collarbone. "We're insane," she whispers with a hint of dark humor, which is usually Jade's department.

"I know-isn't it great?" Jade replies, knowing that her scissors are in her pocket in case she gets overwhelmed, and she thinks about childhood (broken porcelain dolls with badly given haircuts and black crayons and scissors that sheered through everything happy.) But Cat is so innocent and pretty and alive, Jade feels like her memory is receding to make room for Cat, Cat, Cat.

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_Jade's name is silver and sharp, like the blades of her scissors, but it tastes like the first droplets of dew on a blade of grass. Cat decides her name is red and fluffy, but it only tastes like saltiness, like when you taste the teardrops that fall onto your fingertips._

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Someone finds out.

Jade doesn't know who it was, but suddenly, there's a picture of her kissing Cat in the RV on the bulletin board, their naked bodies shielded by the sheets. There's a crowd of students around the photo, whispering, laughing, taunting, and for the first time, they don't withdraw when they see Jade. With scissors in hand, they begin to clear the way, but she hears the little whispers of _"lesbian" _and _"scissor freak."_

She cuts the photo into the tiniest pieces imaginable, until they're like little pieces of reflective dust, that Jade grinds beneath her boot, as the last of the kids walk away from the board, texting at the speed of lightning. When Jade looks up, there's Beck, who looks as if he's seen a ghost, and she wants to reverse time so that she never met Cat, or even had anything to do with the girl.

"Jade…I can't…just-just, don't try," he utters, and that's all he can say and all Jade can listen to, as he walks away, and Jade presses herself against the wall, feeling lonely and afraid and hated, just like her childhood. Suddenly, her scissors seem more powerful, like they can do more to erase the evidence of her love.

_Snip. Snip, snip. Snip, snipsnipsnip-gone._

Cat is on the floor in the hallway, not even seeming to be upset about the photo, simply drawing on the tips of her light red Converse, humming a tune that has to be from a Disney princess movie. Jade feels the anger rising at Cat's calmness to the situation, and all of her feelings from last night seems to evaporate underneath the scorching beams of her fieriness.

"This is all your fault Cat," Jade growls, a sound that comes not from her vocal chords or throat, but from the darkest part of her heart. Cat finally looks up, smiling just like she did that day at the auditions, and Jade suddenly can't take it anymore, as her hands move faster then her brain. The scissors slice directly through Cat's exposed forearm, leaking red velvet cupcake-blood, but the scary thing is, Cat doesn't react. "Do something Cat!" Jade yells at the top of her lungs. "Scream, cry, yell at me, abandon me forever!"

Cat finally loses her smile, but an amused light still lingers in her eyes, as she runs a finger along the wound, running the bloody tip down a strand of her already red hair. "Jade, I could never do any of those things," she whispers, "because if I did, then we wouldn't be happy."

"But I'm not happy!" Jade roars, and she feels so unlike-Jade, because even Jade doesn't even get this mad, but this is different Jade, that she can't recognize. "Because of you, I lost Beck, I lost my reputation, I lost everything, except for you and my scissors!" Jade looks at the drips of blood that are slowly dropping from the tips, and she screams because she's mad at Cat and because she hurt Cat.

"Pleas Jade, don't be mad because I made a mistake…"

Innocent, vulnerable Cat, who is impossible to angry at, Jade doesn't know if she can take it anymore, and she plunges the scissors into Cat, and there's more blood and finally, Cat screams. Jade finds pleasure in this, but it leaves after there are the stares (Tori, Beck, Andre-what did you do? Why?)

Cat's okay, but Jade isn't. Jade proceeds to cut everything she owns to ribbons, and eventually, after everything is broken, she throws the scissors as far as she can into the closest body of water, and cries tears of joy when they sink to the bottom. Jade cries tears of black, because her mascara is running, and she runs six miles to meet Cat, who is recovering in her house.

There's no time for apology, so Jade kisses Cat, and she doesn't care who's watching, or who is criticizing them, because it's easier to love when you don't care who doesn't. Cat wraps her bandaged arms around Jade, and she never gets mad, or expects an apology, and she finds the scissors are gone.

For Jade's birthday, there's a new pair of scissors on her desk, the tips wrapped up in ribbon, with a little card from Cat: "These are to never forget that things can be broken, and that scissors are dangerously pretty. And that we're Jade&Cat, and that you taste like teardrops."

**Wow, I don't really like it, especially since I wanted to do something better for my first time in Victorious…but, I loved Jade and Cat and her obsession with scissors…even if it sucked, tell me in a review! =D! Please!**


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